Songs of a
well-known, the most signicant aspect of Azhagar’s procession is when he enters the river on the fth day.
Azhagar’s outing is celebrated in every hamlet en route. It has a xed itinerary and lasts nine days — four on the way to Madurai, a day by the Vaigai, and four on the way back. There are numerous Thirukanns or pavilions by the wayside (300 and more as per one estimate), and Azhagar halts in each while travelling to and from Madurai. He changes alankarams all along the way, each transformation dictated by a watertight schedule.
The Music Academy library has a book titled Tirumalirum solaimalai Azhagar Kirtanaigal by Sengamalavalli, published in 1932. She was the wife of A.K. Srinivasa Aiyyangar, Tamil lecturer at the Findlay College (now High School, Mannargudi). In the preface, she writes that having had the opportunity to witness the Azhagar festival, she was inspired to compose songs on it.
Detailed account
A remarkable corpus of 54 songs describe every stage of the procession. The language is colloquial and there is basic adherence to rules of prosody, alliteration and metre. Though the raga and tala are indicated for each composition, Sengamalavalli provides no notation. Most songs carry a reference to well-known Carnatic compositions for the tune. The remaining songs are accompanied by a basic swara pattern only for the Pallavi.
The rst nine pieces are in praise of Hayagriva, the kshetra of Azhagarkoil and the presiding deities. The description of the procession actually begins with